"Exactly what one might expect from Lorry too."
"I don't attach much weight to Mr. Raymond's prying, nor does Mrs. Carmac. I told her. Was that right?"
"Quite right."
"But I couldn't help seeing that Lorry must have formed some theory of his own, or he would never have interfered."
"If Lorry were our only bugbear, our troubles would be light. Have you met this Raymond?"
"Oh, yes. Often. He comes to Mrs. Carmac daily for orders; though she or I have to write letters and telegrams, as he can only print laboriously with his left hand."
"Have you seen a good deal of Rupert Fosdyke?"
Now Yvonne had not mentioned Fosdyke's name in her letters. She did not like him. Indeed, she mistrusted him from the moment of their first meeting, when the gallant Rupert favored her with a glance of surprised admiration; which, however, faded into a covert scrutiny on hearing that she was Mrs. Carmac's niece.
Her sentiments toward this new-found "cousin" had developed speedily from passive indifference into active resentment of his ways. Of course there was nothing in Pont Aven to interest an ultra "man about town"; so Fosdyke took to escorting Yvonne from the hotel to Mère Pitou's cottage. At first she yielded out of politeness. When the short promenade became an established custom, and Fosdyke even called for her at the hours she might be expected to visit her mother, she was at a loss to know how to get rid of him. She thought first of Tollemache; but instinct told her that he and Fosdyke would mingle as amicably as fire and oil, and with similar results. Then she sought the assistance of Madeleine Demoret, and thereby added a new burden to an already heavy load; for the village girl became straightway infatuated about the handsome stranger, and Fosdyke, who spoke French fluently, took malicious pleasure in annoying the pretty prude, as he classed Yvonne, by flirting with Madeleine.